This invention relates to board games and in particular to games suitable for two players or two teams of players.
Various games are presently known that employ a checkered, square game board and sets of playing pieces. Perhaps the two most widely played games of this type are the game of checkers and the game of chess, the two of which employ essentially the same game board. In checkers, the square board or playing surface is divided into sixty-four small squares of equal size, which small squares are coloured in checkerboard fashion. Each of the two players has twelve playing pieces, each of which is in the shape of a round disc. The object of the game is to remove all of the opponent's players without losing all of your own players.
In the game of chess, there are several different types of game pieces. Thus each player has eight pawns, two castles, two bishops, two knights, a queen and a king. The manner in which a player can move a game piece on the board depends upon the type of game piece. Again the object of the game of chess is to remove or "take" the other player's men or game pieces without losing all of your own men.
Games that employ a game board having multiple, square playing surfaces are also known. For example U.S. Pat. No. 1,633,445 issued June 21, 1927 to W. W. Gail et al teaches a game board having a large square in each of the four corners of the board. Each of these squares is divided into thirty-six smaller squares that form a checkerboard pattern. The board is used in conjunction with square players or game pieces. The game pieces are provided with one or two letters printed on each. Apparently various rules can be used to govern the manner of play. All of the white squares in each larger square are marked with one or two arrows and none of the squares on the board are numbered.
An early U.S. patent that discloses the use of four rectangular playing areas that are divided into numbered squares is U.S. Pat. No. 1,061,999 issued May 20, 1913 to E. L. Grondahl. The small squares in each of the rectangular areas are numbered from one to twenty. The game is played with counters having faces coloured so that they correspond to the playing fields or rectangular areas and these counters are numbered. The four rectangular areas are arranged along the four sides of a central, square, plain field. When playing the game, the counters are not arranged on the rectangular fields but are placed in a bag or receptacle in order that they may be drawn by each player during his turn.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,228,180 issued Jan. 7, 1941 to H. I. Pauli describes a game board that is divided into squares with each square having four numbers printed thereon. The square game pieces also have four numbers printed thereon. The object of the game is to arrange the game pieces on the squares so that the adjacent numbers of adjacent game pieces will correspond to one another.
An early U.S. patent which employs only a single square playing surface, which surface is divided into thirty-six smaller squares, is U.S. Pat. No. 869,316 issued Oct. 29, 1907 to M. Maris. In this patent the small squares are numbered from one to thirty-six with the number one appearing in the upper left hand corner and the numbers running horizontally from left to right and then right to left. The game is played with thirty square game pieces, each of which has edges with colours, characters or figures matchable one with another at two or more of the sides or spaces.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a novel board game that can be played by two persons or two teams and that provides a real challenge to the players.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a board game wherein the board has four square fields, each divided into a number of smaller squares of equal size, and there are two sets at least of game pieces with each set being numbered from one to a number equal to the number of small squares in each of the four square fields.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a game wherein the object of the game is for each player to be the first to move his game pieces from two square fields having a checkerboard pattern to a square field of a uniform colour corresponding to that of his game pieces.